A Week In America Planning A Wedding

A Week Planning A Wedding — From A $25,000 Budget To A $200,000 One

Welcome to Money Diaries, where we're tackling what might be the last taboo facing modern working women: money. We're asking millennial women how they spend their hard-earned money during a seven-day period — and we're tracking every last dollar. (Thanks, New York mag, for the inspiration.)

Paying for groceries every week and rent every month can get expensive. But add on the cost of a wedding? Yikes.

Thanks to the wedding industrial complex, the event can cost anywhere from several thousand dollars to, well, $31 million. And as we started asking women to spill everything they spent on their weddings, we realized we wanted to know more: How do people think about money as they plan for their big days? And how does the wedding price tag affect everyday decisions, like whether to eat out?

Ahead, we asked four money diarists from different parts of the U.S. to track their weekly spending while planning — and paying for — a wedding.

Money Diaries are meant to reflect individual women’s experiences and do not necessarily reflect Refinery29’s point of view. Refinery29 in no way encourages illegal activity or harmful behavior.The first step to getting your financial life in order is tracking what you spend — to try on your own, check out our guide to managing your money every day. For more money diaries, click here.